On Ellen Degeneres’ TV show, I hear her talking about “hoarding – a debilitating, embarrassing mental health disorder for 3 to 6 million people.” Whoa! That’s a lot of people!

Could I be a hoarder? They say (okay, I say) underwear doesn’t lie. I ldecide to look through my underwear drawer. Hmm. My oldest item is 2,000 years old!

I’m not kidding. My dad, who collected antiques from the Holy Land, left me an ancient glass vase. I love my little vase – its metallic, corroded green color, with just a touch of encrusted, holy dirt. I certainly don’t want to mess it up by using for daisies. So I do the sensible thing – put it in a plastic bag and stick it underneath my old bikini panties with the stretched out elastic. I know that someday I am going to fit back into the panties – just like someday I am going to find a wonderful place to display the glass vase. (Maybe on a shelf in my bookcase after I clear out the books, magazines, newspapers…this is embarrassing!)

What about the drawer under that? Hmm. Old name tags, campaign buttons, ribbons and scrunchies (my hair is too short for either). Should I clean up the clutter? Do I have enough time? While I’m thinking it over, I decide to read The New York Times .

There’s an article about gold being at an all time high. Whoa! Under that mess, there’s some old jewelry that I always mean to wear, but never do (wrong color, broken clasp, missing earring etc.). Didn’t I meet a lady at a party a year ago who owns a store where they buy, sell, and pawn jewelry? There it is: GEM Financial Services, Inc., Brooklyn.

I may not be good at cleaning up clutter. However, I do like to make easy money, and I am good at deadlines. I make an appointment for 4pm and start searching feverishly for my ring. I love my beautiful, old ring …but I never wear it because the setting sticks up and catches on everything – which irritates me (irritation is not a happiness habit). Use it or lose it! Bye-bye ring.

I find the ring, plus $100 in cash and travelers checks, and the pearls with the broken clasp that I got for my bat mitzvah. That means I got them when I was thirteen years old. (How long ago is that, anyway? I could subtract thirteen from my current age …forget it! I don’t do subtraction – or addition – unlike you Nosy Parkers at school reunions who read my graduation year on my name tag and do the math in your heads. Like my old jewelry, I’m still a pearl of a girl – that’s my story and I’m sticking to it!)

Anyway, I cart my old jewelry off to Brooklyn to have it appraised, fixed, and/or discarded. The jewelry nets me$216 in cash, minus $16 to have my pearls re-strung, plus that beautiful ring – Eileen Kaminsky, the owner – a gem of a friend – asks her jeweler to fix it for free!

Happiness Habits:

Clean up clutter! The enemy is procrastination – give yourself a deadline and a reward!